The New Neanderthals: The Rise of the Force is the first of a series of stories that build on the story in The Neanderthals Are Back. The book begins when the owner of a company that uses robots for production and shipping learns about the first group of Neanderthals. The owner enlists the help of two scientists to bring back more Neanderthals through cloning to replace the robots in order to reduce costs. Soon he has a workforce of Neanderthals.

Ten years later, after this operation has been running successfully in secret, some detectives find out about the Neanderthals and they visit the owner with unique proposal. They hope to recruit a team of Neanderthals to help them track down and capture an escaped prisoner who has fled to the desert and mountains. Since prison officials and others in law enforcement have given up on finding the prisoner, the detectives think maybe the Neanderthals can, because they are supposed to be strong, aggressive, have really good vision, and can work well together, such as when out on a hunt.

The new team trains for a few weeks, and once they are ready, the detectives take them to the desert to look for the escaped prisoner. But can the Neanderthals find him, and if they do, can they avoid being shot or killed by a well-armed prisoner? The Rise of the Force tells this story.

Future stories in the series describe how the new Neanderthal force grows and undertakes other missions using low-tech means to help law enforcement capture criminals.